1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an automatic analyzer for automatically analyzing various components of blood, etc., and more particularly to an automatic analyzer capable of loading a larger number of reagents and realizing a higher throughput per unit time.
2. Description of the Related Art
An automatic analyzer for automatically analyzing living samples, such as blood, and outputting analysis results is essential for carrying out analysis with high efficiency in, e.g., large-, medium- and small-scaled hospitals handling a large number of patients, as well as in a clinic center carrying out analysis under contract with those hospitals and doctor's offices.
In that type of automatic analyzer, it is demanded that the system is more compact, is able to perform more kinds of analysis, and has a higher processing speed. To satisfy those demands, various types of automatic analyzers have been proposed so far. For example, Patent Document 1; JP,A 5-10957 discloses an automatic analyzer comprising two reagent disks capable of loading reagents in concentric arrangement, and reagent probes independently movable corresponding to concentric rows of reagent containers. In other words, Patent Document 1 is intended to increase the number of loadable reagents by arranging two reagent disks in concentric relation, and to avoid a reduction of the processing speed by providing reagent probes to be independently movable corresponding to respective rows of reagent containers.
With that disclosed related art, however, because a plurality of reagent probes accessing the row of reagent containers on one reagent disk are operated to rotate about the same rotary shaft, reagents sucked from reagent containers on the same reagent disk can be dispensed just into a reaction cuvette located on the same dispensing position on a reaction disk. Also, reagents sucked from reagent containers on the different reagent disks can be dispensed only to respective positions on the reaction disk different from each other. Thus, analysis cannot be performed at a high speed in random combinations.
To overcome such a problem, Patent Document 2; JP,A 2004-45112 discloses an automatic analyzer including a reagent dispensing probe and provided with a mechanism capable of reciprocally moving the probe not only along a rail interconnecting a plurality of reagent disks, but also in a direction perpendicular to the rail. In other words, Patent Document 2 is intended to enlarge an area where the reagent dispensing probe is movable, thereby widening an area allowing reagent containers and reaction cuvettes to be accessible therein and increasing the degree of freedom in dispensing operations. Further, the processing speed is increased by providing a plurality of reagent dispensing probes which are reciprocally movable along the rail or providing a plurality of rails.